


a memory calling me home

by Miaou Jones (miaoujones)



Category: Free!
Genre: Future Fic, M/M, Magical Realism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-18
Updated: 2017-07-18
Packaged: 2018-12-03 15:38:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,150
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11535234
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/miaoujones/pseuds/Miaou%20Jones
Summary: haru is sixteen when the voices start.





	a memory calling me home

**Author's Note:**

  * For [earlgrey_milktea](https://archiveofourown.org/users/earlgrey_milktea/gifts).



> written for saso 2017, bonus round 4. title borrowed from the waterboys.

haru is sixteen when the voices start. at first he thinks they're just his imagination, or maybe a stress response to that night, the night he almost lost makoto. 

that's when the voices started, and at very first, in the moment of hearing them that very first time, he didn't think they were for him—he thought they must be talking to makoto, and that maybe they'd been talking to makoto for a while now, and that's why makoto had not wanted to swim in the ocean...

but when haru asks, several times, each in a roundabout way of its own, makoto gives no indication of hearing voices. as an experiment, haru goes down to the ocean on his own and puts his toes in the surf. and hears the voices. 

he hears a voice at their next practice too. a different voice, a singular one. he hears another one when he goes to itsc, so similar to the one he heard at school; other singular voices at samezuka, at regionals, at the national pool in australia. 

everywhere he swims, voices speak to him.

when he turns pro, he has a session with a sports psychologist. it's a condition of sponsorship, and sponsorship is a _de facto_ condition of being a pro, so haru does it. it turns out to be not at all like what he was expecting. he doesn't mind it at all. 

he decides to go to another psychologist, one unaffiliated with his sponsor, one to whom his name won't mean anything. 

"i hear voices," haru says at the second session, looking at the psychologist.

the psychologist looks back. "in your head?"

haru shakes his head. "in my life."

the psychologist sits back. "ah. and what are they saying?"

haru tells her. he ends up telling her more about himself than he'd intended to but he thinks it's fine, because she sat back when he said the voices aren't in his head. he talks with her about being a professional athlete, a swimmer, the pressures of making the national team and the upcoming olympic trials, especially with the games in tokyo later this year. 

he talks about a lot of things with her and he feels lighter when he leaves her office.

but as soon as he dives into the pool at the tatsumi international swimming center, he hears a voice.

when he's done, he takes the train to a bus line and then walks down to the shore. he stands at the edge, listening to the wordless roar and rush and crash of the waves. he walks in up to his knees, and listens to the chorus of voices.

he walks back to the bus stop, waits, takes the bus to the train to a different stop, walks to makoto's apartment. "do you want to go swimming with me," haru says when makoto answers the door, not bothering with inflection.

makoto glances down at haru's trousers, still damp up to the knee. he smiles when he meets haru's eyes again.

they go to the pool at makoto's school. he's teaching japanese language and he's also the swim coach for the boys' middle school team. haru has been here once before, when makoto first started coaching here, and he remembers the timbre of the voice here.

they dive in and swim a few laps. makoto does his backstroke start on one lap and haru is grateful he happened to be looking just then: makoto's backstroke dive is just as beautiful as it was in high school.

"race me," haru says, catching up with makoto at the far end of the pool. 

makoto laughs, head tipping back. haru has seen him laugh like this before, but he can't take his eyes away this time. 

when makoto tips back down he's smiling, his gaze clear as he looks at haru. "race me," haru says.

"all right," makoto says after uncounted heartbeats, breaking the silence in the gaze but not breaking the gaze itself. "freestyle, of course. one hundred meters?"

haru nods. they climb out and walk around the sides of the pool to take their places. haru is content for makoto to count them down, so makoto does: 

three—two—one:

and they dive in, one and the other.

and in that same breath, they start to swim.

haru's cycle has him turned towards makoto with each breath, but because haru's reaction time off the blocks was so much quicker, it takes him several strokes to understand what he's seeing, and several more to decide what to do about it.

he slows, stops, treads water, the bottom of the pool too far for his feet to reach without taking him under.

makoto passes him—stops, too. pulls his goggles down to dangle around his neck. "haru?" 

"i'm all right," haru says to the concern furrowing makoto's brow. 

makoto pushes the lane divider down and floats over it, propels himself to haru with usual strokes. he says haru's name again; he's always said haru's name a lot, more than anyone else, more than normal.

"i'm all right," haru says to the concern darkening makoto's eyes. like storm clouds, haru thinks in an unexpectedly poetic moment. 

he means to ask when makoto took up butterfly, but he forgets to when he looks into makoto's eyes, looking into him. he turns from the storm but doesn't leave it behind as he swims to the end of the lane and makoto follows.

when they get to the end, makoto hoists himself out and sits on the edge, and haru doesn't. "i hear voices," haru says, not looking at makoto or makoto's eyes or any storm that is or isn't there. "telling me what to do."

"what are they telling you to do?" 

it's the obvious question and haru shouldn't be disappointed, but somehow he thought makoto might have something different to say.

he swallows the disappointment. swallows the remaining heaviness on his tongue.

"swimming pools—everywhere, including this one—tell me to go home," haru says. he looks at makoto and makoto is looking at him. haru can't read his expression, but right now it's enough that makoto is looking. "and the ocean tells me to come home."

he waits for makoto to tell him he should move back to iwatobi or take up competitive open water swimming, the obvious responses, the ones the psychologists have suggested to him.

makoto stands up, walks to the head of haru's lane, bends and holds out his hand in one fluid movement, and everything about him is so _fluid_ right now, his smile too, his smile reaching his eyes and shimmering there~ his smile most of all, and all the unseeable everything flowing from it, all the everything that can't be seen or touched but that haru feels, oh, that he _feels_ ~

"so come home," makoto says, smiling; holding out his hand and shimmering and smiling.


End file.
